Does anybody here have an interest in macroeconomics?

[rva_jeremy]

There's no such thing as a forced capitalism.

Well, this just gets us into "no true Scotsman" territory. I get what you're saying; I just don't find it a very useful argument since, if we can't judge actual, self-described capitalist systems as capitalist, then nobody can make a verifiable positive or negative statement about it at all.

Let me put it this way: as long as you have a property title system enforced by state power, whatever economic system that is in place is by definition "forced". I'd also ask you to consider the well-documented penchant humans have for outright contradiction within their ideologies. Seems to me there's a forced version of everything.

Capitalism is about continuously building the better mousetrap, and those who can't build the better mousetrap are taken out.  It's creative destruction with competition between small companies.

As somebody who used to be a big booster of capitalism (Gary remembers) let me just suggest that you could make a better argument. Who wants to live in a world where, if you don't keep up, you get "taken out"? I get why Schumpeter's idea here is important, but the idea that the only way to innovate is through ruthless competition is just not borne out by history at all. It might be the most "efficient", but you can only make that judgment by ignoring the ways in which it is inefficient (e.g. the massive waste and fraud in the tax-advantaged R&D sector, the opportunity costs of more decentralized, small scale innovation sans patents and copyrights, etc).

Is the definition of capitalism taught with a Marxist/Leninist slant now?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism <= that's what I was taught. Private property, capital accumulation, private means of production. I especially point you to the etymology section of the article. Capitalism, from its beginning uses, has been tied to the state-chartered joint stock corporation since its inception. And the term "capitalism" was popularized by Marx and other 19th century socialists. It always surprises me that defenders of free markets and private property adopt their critics' terms and then want to argue over definitions!

That said, we need capitalism now because we need fast innovation.  The structure of our economy is currently aligned with 4th Density NEGATIVE principles, and to break out of this, we will need technologies that remove us from centralized systems quickly (the centralized systems will fall apart quickly when things start breaking).

I totally don't get this. With the way that the patent, trademark, and copyright system is set up, the returns on innovation seem to always accrue disproportionately to capital, not to the human innovators. This seems to me to be the exact opposite of what we'd want if our goal were to disrupt and break up concentrated control of the economy.

Thanks for your replies, Scott.